Omega Six Five by Bryan James

Author:Bryan James
Language: eng
Format: epub

***

“What’s so interesting?” Emma asked, leaning over sergeant Rhodes’ shoulder and squinting at the screen.

“I don’t know, LT. But I needed another set of ears and eyes. Just intercepted a garbled transmission back from one of the security teams on Perkins’ site. Said something about a T-six blast, and a cave-in. I know I’m not supposed to be on that channel, but I was scanning locally to try to scrub some interference from our MEC coms, and I picked it up by chance.”

The sergeant was leaning forward at the radio console, turning a holographic dial to tune the equipment.

“But it cut out, and I didn’t have time to record it.”

She grimaced, looking out through the window in the dome wall out over the darkening landscape. It was almost sunset, and any teams on the surface should be making their way home soon.

“You tell the Commander?” she asked.

“No sir,” Rhodes said, and hesitated. “He says stuff like that is Company security purview, not ours. I just thought ...” She trailed off, unsure of how to articulate her thought, which she was now realizing contradicted the orders of her commanding officer.

Emma corrected her quickly, “Easy, Sergeant. You’re right to tell me. No action at this time, but alert Hotrod and Thumper to the message. Tell them to cut their northern circuit short and make their way back via the eastern route. That should bring them close by the time we have more information. If there’s anything to investigate, they’ll be standing by. And if anyone asks, they got lost and deviated from their route because their positioning systems went on the fritz.”

“Yes sir,” she said, smiling slightly. She tapped the side of her ear, where the slim boom from the microphone emerged from a small earpiece. “Thumper, this is Pisces, relaying patrol override ...”

Emma phased out the sergeant’s voice as she stared into the distance, watching the wind kick up in swirling clouds of black dust, imaging the frigid temperatures that were coming and wondering what the hell would possess a site leader to keep his people out in the shit past their due-in time.

Tapping her fingers on the computer console briefly, she turned around, arms across her chest.

Perkins. She remembered him from an awkward interaction during her orientation, when she caught him staring at her chest while delivering an introductory lecture on the mining and ore exploration schedules. Seemed competent at the time.

They must have located a pocket of ore and got worked up in the excitement of the find.

She checked the time, and shook her head.

They should know better. Once the sun went down, the planet was a dead zone. No personnel could survive those conditions. They were on a clock, and they were running out of time.

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